A potpourri of interesting current events, new products, humor and just plain fun, so pull up a chair and stay a while.If your favorite post has disappeared out of sight, you can find it by selecting a category from the left hand side bar.

*

I am Perry Peterson, a retired auditor and tax accountant. My wife Valeta and I live along the front range of the beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains.

Please note: some of the links in older postings on this website may have expired by the time you see them.

c

June 30, 2013

It took 50 years for American attitudes about marijuana to zigzag from the paranoia of "Reefer Madness" to the excesses of Woodstock back to the hard line of "Just Say No."

The next 25 years took the nation from Bill Clinton, who famously "didn't inhale," to Barack Obama, who most emphatically did.

And now, in just a few short years, public opinion has moved so dramatically toward general acceptance that even those who champion legalization are surprised at how quickly attitudes are changing and states are moving to approve the drug — for medical use and just for fun.

According to the Mirriam-Webster online dictionary a demagogue a leader who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power.

Even those who believe that emissions of carbon dioxide are causing unacceptable warming of the earth — and frankly the evidence for that is thus far less than convincing — should be ashamed of President Obama’s demagogic arguments for action.

The fact sheet on the president’s speech said carbon “pollution” is “contributing to higher rates of asthma attacks and more frequent and severe floods and heat waves.” His measures would “protect the health of our children.”

“For the children” usually means the orator has run out of good arguments.

The President went on to say that carbon “pollution” is causing Lyme disease. Why not pile on a few other calamities for good measure? Plantar fasciitis‎ and diverticulitis may be good candidates. That’s ridiculous of course but so are many of the Presidents climate and carbon claims.

What Obama is leading up to is cap and trade - a tax on carbon emissions.

___________________________________

Cap and trade would force companies large and small, especially manufacturing companies, to buy “carbon offsets” which will be no different than a tax on those businesses.

The cap and trade scheme will not stop pollution at all. It will simply make big polluters pay more in taxes.

The Obama administration is depending on these vast new carbon revenues to fund big-government spending plans.

Liberal politicians in Washington love the idea of cap and trade because they can claim to be taxing "polluters," not workers.

In reality, workers will suffer because companies faced with a new carbon tax will hire fewer workers or close their doors.

___________________________________

As for climate change:

Professor John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville, a skeptic, calculates that a 50 percent reduction in annual U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide by 2050 — a far greater reduction than Obama seeks — would, according to current models, produce in 2100 a reduction in average temperature of 0.13 degree Fahrenheit.

"Doomsday scenarios depend largely on unreliable computer models whose builders have no explanation for such conflicts."

Without believable computer models, it’s senseless to follow Obama down the road of economic self-mutilation.

Historians claim Obama's door of no return which he visited to highlight the evils of slavery is a 'scam' and was actually used as a garbage dump.

When President Barack Obama visited the 'Door of No Return' on a Senegalese island on Thursday, he believed he was looking at where Africans were shipped across the Atlantic into slavery. But not all may be as it first seemed.

Looking out on a previous garbage dump!

Historians claim that the entrance of Slave House on Goree Island where Obama posed for a photo opportunity was most likely only used for disposing of garbage.

Professor Ralph Austen of the University of Chicago said: “There are literally no historians who believe the Slave House is what they're claiming it to be, or that believe Goree was statistically significant in terms of the slave trade.”

Besides portrayals of the fighting, the re-enactment includes about 200 individuals representing the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania in 1863.

Confederate troops above move into position during a re-enactment of the Battle of Gettysburg on June 28.

Union re-enactors below fire at a Confederate charge.

The event is taking place at Bushey Farm, outside park property.

150 years ago the Union prevailed at Gettysburg, a turning point in the four-year war that claimed at least 620,000 lives. The population of New York City was only about 515,000 at the start of the Civil War.

After the battle, the deadliest ever on US soil with nearly 8,000 dead and tens of thousands injured, the southern army began its retreat.

___________________________________

The war is often called the War of Northern Aggression by many southerners. In reality, the war began when General Beauregard of South Carolina ordered the firing on the Union army at Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor on Apr 12, 1861.

___________________________________

The Civil war 150th anniversary celebrations and re-enactments will continue next weekend in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

June 28, 2013

The CIA wants its officers to stop leaking secrets to reporters, says a memo leaked to a reporter.

You just can’t make this stuff up!

___________________________________

CIA Director John Brennan (pictured) is launching a new campaign aimed at pressuring CIA officers to keep the intelligence agency's secrets secret, after a series of leaks to the media.

In a memo to the CIA workforce this week, Brennan says the "Honor the Oath," campaign is intended to "reinforce our corporate culture of secrecy" through education and training. The Associated Press obtained the memo Wednesday, marked unclassified and for official use only.

The Virgin Mary is one of the most cherished and respected images for Catholics around the world.

The Santa Fe Reporter newspaper is probably not owned by a Catholic. The paper published a cartoon of a woman representing the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe wearing sunglasses and a skimpy bikini bathing suit as part of the newspaper’s summer guide.

The editor of the Santa Fe Reporter refused to do an interview, but she posted this blog post in response to the controversy:

The intent of our Summer Guide cover design was not to insult or denigrate any religion or ethnicity, but rather to incorporate an important part of Santa Fe's culture into an image that also unites other diverse cultures that flourish in our city.